


As You Are

by orphan_account



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Alien anatomy, Angst, Bonded Spirk, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Jealousy, M/M, TOS compliant, The Enterprise Incident, emotional insecurity, issues of self-esteem, post-episode
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-31
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-04-16 11:20:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14163726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: “Well I…” he reached for his currently pointed ears.“Captain, please go.”  Spock’s voice was pointed, efficient, cold.  “Somehow they do not look aesthetically agreeable on humans.”Jim saw the way Spock looked at the Romulan commander, felt the tension between them, so it's only natural he thinks Spock might prefer him a different way.  That is not, entirely, the case.





	As You Are

**Author's Note:**

> So I got sucked into The Enterprise Incident-- for those who might not know the episode-- Spock basically seduces the Romulan Commander so they can steal a cloaking device. Jim has Bones doctor him up to look like a Romulan in order to complete the task.
> 
> There's a moment in the episode where Jim seems hurt by Spock's rejection of him with Vulcan-y eyebrows and ears, so I decided to write an after-the-episode moment of Spock letting Jim know exactly why he doesn't want him looking like a Romulan...or a Vulcan.
> 
> I used some fan-created theories about Spock's anatomy for this when it comes to their sex, which I think are pretty common. Also the beginning has dialogue taken from the episode itself. 
> 
> And I think that's it. Enjoy!

“You’re needed in surgery.” Bones' tone comes in slightly amused, slightly exasperated.

“What for?”

There was laughter in Bones’ voice. “Well Jim, I’m gonna bob your ears.”

Jim reached for his ears, and it was only then he realized Spock was standing at his side. Something curled in his belly, white hot and unpleasant—sitting somewhere between pain and sadness, and making him want to reach out. “Well I…” he reached for his currently pointed ears.

“Captain, please go.” Spock’s voice was pointed, efficient, cold. “Somehow they do not look aesthetically agreeable on humans.”

Jim’s throat went tight, and was grateful in that moment Bones spoke, because he couldn’t. “Well, are you coming? Or do you want to go through life looking like your First Officer?”

Jim looked at Spock who stared back without a hint of expression, and Jim curled in on himself, hoping he wasn’t showing it, but unable to stop the sudden wave of anger and jealousy because he had ordered Spock to do whatever it took so they could get the cloaking device, and deep down he knew to expect that Spock might feel something—had always known that as a Vulcan, even a half-Vulcan, Spock would always be drawn to those closer to what he was.

Jim could never be that. He could never be Romulan, and he could never be Vulcan, no matter how Bones dressed him up, and Spock was making that plain right now.

“I’m on my way. Mr. Spock, you have the conn.”

He rose, silent after that, unable to stop reaching up to attempt to hide the way he’d masked himself, the way he’d hoped Spock might look at him the way he caught Spock looking at _her_ , and he hurried out, away from the quiet snickers of Sulu and Chekov who had no idea what it all really meant.

~*~ 

“I’m recovering in my quarters, and I really don’t want to hear your arguments about it, Bones.” Jim couldn’t make himself sound stern or angry. His fatigue was all too present and pressing, and Bones seemed to know that trying to get Jim to stay was futile.

He left, not sparing a glance backward because the last thing he wanted to see was the pity on Bones’ face.

~*~ 

Jim wasn’t asleep, but he’d zoned out enough that he hadn’t realized he wasn’t alone until a hand touched his shoulder. It was fleeting—there and gone in a breath, but it was enough to jar him out of his thoughts. His head whipped to the side, and he saw Spock standing a step away, hands now clasped behind his back.

“I trust the procedure was painless,” he said after some time.

Jim sighed quietly, and couldn’t stop himself from rubbing at the warmth building in his eyes. There was an ache in his ears, around his eyebrows from Bones’ work, but nothing he couldn’t handle. “As it ever is,” was his only real reply.

Spock made a soft, considering noise—unusual for the Vulcan. There was a line of tension in his shoulders, in his jaw which Jim wanted to reach out and smooth, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He was reeling from the mission—from what he’d asked Spock to do, what he knew it would cost him because he had known the Romulan Commander would have a lure Jim would never possess.

And foolishly, ridiculously, he had hoped he could give Spock something of that—even if it was brief, and instead he’d been rejected.

And as much as it wasn’t Spock’s fault for being who he was—what he was—just as much as it wasn’t Jim’s fault for being an illogical human, it still stung.

“I have managed to offend you in some way, and I wish to inquire what I have done so I may endeavor to not repeat the action.” His words were perfunctory, but there was a heat and a worry to them that only Jim ever got to hear.

Or well, until the Romulan ship. Until _she_ was at Spock’s side.

Jim groaned and rubbed his face hard with a flat palm. “It’s nothing.”

“Incorrect,” Spock challenged, and took one step forward.

Jim hated how well Spock could read him. “Look it’s nothing you did, okay? It’s…me. It’s my fault.”

“If you will permit me to hypothesize,” Spock said, then didn’t wait for Jim’s permission. “Your heart rate increased, and the expression of hurt on your face began just before you were recalled to surgery to correct the Romulan features added to your person. I can only assume that it was my words of distaste in seeing Romulan features on you which has caused the offense. I hypothesize as well that you were feeling the very common and human emotion of insecurity due to the events aboard the Romulan ship. All of this is logical. What is not logical is why you felt emotional pain when I suggested you return to your previous, natural state of human features.”

Jim swallowed thickly and rose, dragging a hand through his hair as he thought. “I’m not an idiot, you know. I knew that there might be a…moment of temptation when you were asked to distract her at any cost.”

Spock nodded his head. “It is…biological. It is no different than a biological reaction you have experienced on missions in the past.”

“I get it,” Jim said, and turned, his backside pressed against his desk. He folded his arms over his chest, knowing it was a defensive maneuver which Spock would see right through, but his human illogic demanded a physical barrier between him and the Vulcan. “I just ah…I mean. I know you like me. I know you find me pleasing to look at. You’ve told me enough times.”

Something in those words caused something in Spock to crack, and suddenly he crossed the distance between them in two quick strides. His hand lifted, pressing a palm to Jim’s cheek, his voice low and full of heat. “I have made you aware,” he said, very slowly, “on multiple occasions, that the level of pleasing I find you often transcends spoken language. There is no part of you which I would wish different, Jim.”

Jim felt his cheeks heat up, and he couldn’t stop himself from reaching up, clasping Spock’s wrist to push his hand more firmly against his own skin. “I just wonder sometimes if maybe you’d be happier…”

“Negative,” Spock said, interrupting quickly.

“But the way you looked at her…”

Spock closed his eyes for a brief moment, then opened them again. “I would not change the actions of the mission. They provided exactly what was necessary to obtain the cloaking device which will aid Starfleet in its future endeavors. We successfully protected the crew from danger, and managed to evade Romulan capture. Regretfully, we are still in possession of their commander, but as we do intend to return her to her people at the nearest base, there was no real harm done.”

Jim nodded, leaning into Spock’s space and feeling something settle in him when the motion was not only welcomed, but encouraged by Spock’s other arm winding around his waist to ensure very little, if any, space existed between them.

“If there was ever a time that you realized you would be more satisfied with another…” Jim stopped himself as a wash of lust and want and affection and love poured into him through Spock’s touch. “I get it,” he said, interrupting his own train of thought with a faint chuckle. “I know you want me.”

“And yet you persist in making assumptions which have no basis in fact. I regret the emotional turmoil I have caused the Romulan Commander. She entrusted me with loyalty and even something so precious as her name. I cannot view that as frivolous, Jim. But it does not change the fact that I would have chosen you. That I _will_ choose you, regardless of the situation. I have done so in the past, and will continue to do so in the future.”

Jim nodded, and turned his head to kiss Spock the human way for a long, careful moment. “I’m sorry for being irrational.”

“You are human, and therefore subject to the whims of your emotions. I do not begrudge you this,” Spock said. His hand eased up off Jim’s cheek, but didn’t go far, traveling down the line of his jaw. His thumb brushed along Jim’s bottom lip, then down the underside of his chin, making his intentions known. “I do not find you pleasing with the look of Romulan. Nor would I find you pleasing with the look of a Vulcan, or anything other than your natural state, Jim.” His hand lifted and traced around Jim’s now-round ears, his now human eyebrows. “I find it unsettling when you are not yourself.”

Jim nodded, and let himself understand exactly what Spock’s rejection had been all about. And how much more it meant now to not just hear the truth, but to _feel_ it pulsing under his skin as Spock touched him. “I love you.”

“I cherish thee, t’hy’la,” Spock murmured back in Standard, then leaned his head down and captured Jim in another kiss. It was soft, slow and lazy at first, but heat quickly built between them. Jim could feel the first stirrings from Spock against his thigh as he eased his leg between Spock’s and pushed upward.

Spock groaned into his mouth, and Jim allowed himself to bask in the fact that Spock only allowed himself to be this way in front of him. He wondered, for a moment, if he’d dropped his emotional guard at all with the commander, but he quickly pushed thought away in favor of enjoying what was his.

Because Spock was. And it had been proven year after year, mission after mission.

A lot had happened—memories erased, biochemicals infecting their blood, and there had been marriages and relationships and near deaths, and those had only served to bring them closer. To bring them to this moment, right here, and right now.

“I want to get my mouth on you,” Jim murmured. His hand was traveling low, cupping Spock through his uniform, feeling the way his slit was starting to engorge, swell a little in preparation for his penis to grow fat and long. Jim’s mouth watered for it, and Spock sucked his breath in through his teeth as he grabbed Jim by the collar and hauled him away from the desk, and straight to the bed.

They wasted no time pulling clothes off, letting them pile on the floor as Jim shoved Spock back against the pillows and crouched between his crooked knees. Jim ran his hands wildly up Spock’s naked thighs, his fingertips taking so much pleasure in the feel of dark, coarse hair beneath them.

He didn’t wait too long, just a moment to watch the soft, green blush rising on Spock’s cheeks before he dipped his head low and delved his tongue into the sheath which protected Spock’s genitals. It was wet and sticky, warm, with the bitter, salty taste Jim had come to be so familiar with. His tongue brushed along the villi which were trembling in their high vibration, wanting to feel pleasure and to give it.

Spock began to grow then, and Jim backed up just slightly, his mouth open and waiting as Spock’s penis engorged and lengthened and filled him. Jim gagged just for a second, but didn’t pull off even as Spock’s hand found the back of his neck and pushed. Jim took it, gave as much as he wanted to give, and with a long, hard suck, Spock’s head rolled back and he came.

Spock never lasted long, especially when Jim used his mouth, and this time was no different. Spock recovered faster than Jim always did, too, which meant Jim was soon on his back and Spock was over him, mouth-to-mouth in a heated kiss while his long, sensitive Vulcan fingers curled around Jim’s erection. He stroked him with such precise pressure and motion that within just a few minutes Jim was fucking himself in the curl of Spock’s fist, and gasping Spock’s name, and coming. 

Jim flopped backward, his head reeling with the ebb and flow of pleasure that he could feel between their bond as Spock got up to find something to clean them with. It was with slight surprise that Jim realized Spock was still naked when he slid back into the bed, tucking himself up close to Jim. He discarded the soiled towel, and curled one hand around Jim’s hip, his face pushing into his neck.

Very faint, very soft, Jim could hear a contented purr rumbling in Spock’s chest, and it made his lips quirk into a smile.

“Ashayam,” Spock said, very softly into Jim’s still warm skin, “taluhk nash-veh k'dular.”

Jim let the meaning of the words flow over him in a caress without bothering to translate. He didn’t need to. He preferred the words in Vulcan, Spock’s language, and spoken in a way that was without hesitation or second thought. It was raw, absolute affection shown only to him either in their private time, or silently through their bond.

It was easy to forget some days, when space was unkind to them, and when they had to throw themselves into harm’s way. Sometimes, when they were asked to perform tasks against their nature for the good of the crew, or the Federation, or each other, it was hard to feel the link between them. But it always came back to this—the soft moments in their bed, with Spock holding him, and Jim quietly reminding himself that Spock doesn’t want a Vulcan, or a Romulan, or anything other than exactly who he is.

“Your mind is quite correct, Jim,” Spock said after feeling Jim’s inner turmoil. “It does not lead you astray this time. My regard for you is for exactly who you are.” His hand lifted, stroking over Jim’s ear again. “I did not wish to see you like her, because I have not placed a piece of my katra within her. It resides in you.” His fingers pushed against Jim’s psi-points just lightly, just enough to feel the physical part of their bond flare to life, before dying down into the slow, burning ember that was always inside of him. “Do you take comfort in that knowledge?”

“Yes.” It was unbridled honesty, and he turned to seal it with a kiss—first his mouth, then the ozh’esta. Spock’s fingers were warm against his own, and soft. “I’ll do my best to remember it.”

“As there has come before, there will be a time again which you will need reminding. And I am more than happy to provide that for you, t’hy’la.”

Jim laughed quietly as he pulled Spock closer. “Yeah, Spock. I’m sure you will.”

As he ordered the lights down to five percent and snuggled in for the night, he felt the curve of Spock’s real, and perfect smile up against his shoulder.

**Author's Note:**

> Translation: 
> 
> Ashayam, taluhk nash-veh k'dular- Beloved, I cherish thee.


End file.
